


If I could, I'd make a deal with God, and get him to swap our places

by irondad_and_spiderson



Series: Running up that hill [1]
Category: Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Anxiety, Avengers: Endgame (Movie) Spoilers, Canon Divergence - Avengers: Endgame (Movie), Character Death Fix, F/M, Fix-It, Fix-It of Sorts, Hurt Peter Parker, Hurt Tony Stark, Hurt/Comfort, Irondad, M/M, Parent Tony Stark, Peter Parker Needs a Hug, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Temporary Character Death, Think piece on death, Tony Stark Has A Heart, Tony Stark Needs a Hug, background stucky, spiderson
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-26
Updated: 2019-04-26
Packaged: 2020-02-04 16:06:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,379
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18607906
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/irondad_and_spiderson/pseuds/irondad_and_spiderson
Summary: That’s the funny thing about time. Everyone experiences it differently. Sometimes five years feels like five years, sometimes it feels like thirty minutes, sometimes it feels like forever, wandering aimlessly in the same unchanging orange glow. Time moves differently when you don’t need to breathe, can’t feel, can’t hear.Lying here on the ground that looks like the sky, because they are one and the same in purgatory. Eternity waits for no man, and Peter Parker has to accept that.-x-Peter is trapped in the soul stone after the snap, and it affects linger long after he gets to come back.





	If I could, I'd make a deal with God, and get him to swap our places

**Author's Note:**

> Title is from Running up that hill by Placebo

It’s like he’s floating. He wonders if this is what dying feels like, what being dead is, just, floating. So, he stays that way for a long time, allowing himself to drift. He’s grateful that it isn’t cold here, not that it feels warm either. In fact, Peter can’t feel much of anything. Just a barely strung together series of thoughts floating endlessly in between somewhere and nowhere.

He supposes that he must be somewhere if he can think but not feel, simply because he exists. He exists.

Relief doesn’t come with this revelation. Only a slew of questions bubbles up, bombarding his consciousness, many of them too vast to comprehend if he considers the fact that he probably just died.

He can’t tell how long he’s been here, he hasn’t been keeping track. He thinks perhaps it hasn’t been that long, but it feels like an eternity all the same.

He’d been on Titan, with the strange doctor and ragtag group of aliens that called themselves the Guardians of the Galaxy, and the other Peter, and Mr Stark. And they’d lost.

The thought comes unbidden, Mr Stark clinging to him, willing him to stay, the fear, the panic, trying to hold on, desperate not to go.

He opens his eyes. Peter supposes he must have them, given that everything is cast in an orange glow. The sky is orange, and he dares to hope for a moment that he is back on Titan. But he knows better than to hope, the silence is all too deafening, and the orange sky stretches on and on.

If he has eyes to open, he might as well try to sit up. So, he does. As far as Peter can see is orange, that same unyielding, unforgiving colour on an endless horizon. It hurts to look at, so he looks down at where his body should be instead, only there is nothing. It doesn’t make sense, being able to see and sit up without a body, being able to exist without a form. Perhaps if he’s had a body, he might’ve had the ability to feel sick.

He tries calling out, for Aunt May, for Mr Stark, Ned, MJ, anyone. But he doesn’t have a body, or a throat or a mouth so he makes no sound, just their names ringing like a scream in his thoughts. He stops when his head hurts, which doesn’t make sense and he wishes he could cry. None of it makes much sense really.

But he can think and see and move, so he does, because it’s better than doing nothing, even if they are one and the same.

So, he walks, counting the steps he takes with the body he doesn’t have, and the world around his stays exactly the same orange glow. Every thousand steps he wills himself onto the next thousand, telling himself something will eventually have to change. He wonders whether he is alone, or surrounded by others, just unable to see one another, reach out and touch one another, ships passing in the night on an amber sea.

At ten thousand steps Peter wonders whether the swirling shapes, the things he can see in his peripheral vision are his mind playing tricks on him, trying to compensate for the lack of information, trying to make sense of the endless orange glow.

Peter keeps walking, losing count around fifteen thousand, and still, the empty landscape stretches on and on and he considers how long he could keep going. With no body to get tired, he supposes he could go on forever. The limits of his sanity he tries not to think about.

Eventually, his mind drifts to those thoughts, there’s only so long you can go without thinking about anything. Who else hadn’t survived the snap? What had happened to Aunt May, his friends? Were they stuck in this place too and he was just unable to reach them? What if they had survived, would they even know about what had happened to him on Titan? Would Mr Stark even be able to get back to earth? How long had he even been here?

That fight or flight response makes him run, run towards that never-ending horizon, willing himself to feel anything, for his legs to burn from lactic acid, for his lungs to heave, for a breeze to tug at his hair and clothes.

Panicking is hard when you can't hyperventilate, can’t scream yourself hoarse, can’t kick or punch anything. Existing feels like a punishment. He must have fallen, because he is on the ground, and curls up, making himself as small as possible and closes his eyes. Only closing his eyes doesn’t make the orange any less bright, still just staring at nothing. Peter wasn’t prepared for death to feel like this. To feel everything and to feel nothing. So afraid but unable to cry.

Lying here on the ground that looks like the sky, because they are one and the same in purgatory. Eternity waits for no man, and Peter Parker has to accept that.

-x-

The snap had ripped him, atom from atom, as he had desperately tried to cling to Mr Stark, to the reality that was slowly slipping away from him. It had hurt, like being burnt so badly your nerve endings got destroyed and you couldn’t feel anything anymore. Whispered out the plea that he didn’t want to go before his lungs collapsed and he had been lost.

Getting put back together hurt so much worse. Each atom painstakingly stitching themselves back together to make him whole again. Every nerve carefully crafted back into existence and it burns so much he could scream but his lungs haven’t reformed yet and every muscle fibre contracts and cramps with pain.

The blood roaring in his ears reminds him he can hear and that he’s alive, _holy shit, he’s alive._ He can feel every rock and bump in the ground beneath his back because he has a body again.

He can breathe.

The hot dusty air hurts his throat and lungs, his eyes water against the brilliant blue sky and he can see, really see. There’s metallic taste, blood in his mouth, and the smell of dirt and sweat, and it’s _everything, everything, everything_ , all at once.

Someone is coughing, someone else is crying and Peter just focuses on trying to breathe, trying not to panic, trying not to cry.

Then Dr Strange tells them it’s been five years and it had been hard enough to breathe before that.

“Where’s Mr Stark?” He asks but his voice is so quite either the doctor doesn’t hear him or chooses to ignore the question.

“We have to go to Earth,” and he doesn’t hesitate in opening up a portal. Peter is still shaky on his feet and can see Mantis wiping the remaining tears from her eyes and Quill staggering to stand also. He has to ask, that thing that is on all of their minds.

“Did we win?”

Dr Strange casts him a look over his shoulder, Peter almost thinks he sees guilt in those tired eyes.

“Not yet.”

-x-

There’s no time to rest. No time to recover from getting back from wherever they had all just been. The battle is still in full swing and it’s all Peter can do not to get knocked out every ten seconds. All the while frantically searching for a glimpse of a red and gold suit, just to know that he’s okay. Just to know that he’s alive.

Not until he runs right into him does he see him. Dr Strange must be right about it having been five years, Mr Stark is a lot greyer than he remembers. It feels like forever ago and only yesterday that he was dying in his arms.

Tony’s face is a confused mash of emotions, happiness, guilt, awe, tears Peter pretends not to notice for Tony’s sake. The older man pulls him into a hug, and after an eternity of _nothing, nothing, nothing,_ being held feels like so much.

“Oh, this is nice,” he mutters, trying desperately to ignore the feeling that right here and now does he feel safer than anywhere else on the planet, with Mr Stark’s strong arms around him. Stark just hugs him tighter and Peter wills himself not to cry.

“I got you back,” the words are so quiet Peter almost misses them in the roar of another explosion. His breath hitches and he nods against Mr Stark’s neck.

“You got me.”

-x-

Peter loses track of Mr Stark somewhere around when Valkyrie pulls him up onto her flying horse, which he feels he would appreciate much more under different circumstances because who knew flying horses existed?

Right now, it’s all he can do to keep hold of the gauntlet.

An explosion of bright orange fire sends him crashing to the ground, the legs of his spider suit shattering with the impact and he rolls to a halt.

Everything hurts, but it reminds him that he’s alive, as he wraps his body around the gauntlet, rubble piling around him. He can feel where his side touches the ground, the burn of acid in his legs, the metallic taste of blood in his mouth every time there is another flash of orange light. It lets him know he’s not dead yet.

The glowing lady, Carol, she smiles at him like everything is fine, and he feels so small.

“Hey, Peter Parker. Got something for me?”

-x-

“We won Mr Stark,” everything feels so terribly wrong, “we won Mr Stark,” the lump in his throat is like a fist, tears well unbidden in his eyes.

Tony just sits there, eyes glazed, half his body burnt, Peter can’t bring himself to look at his right arm.

“You did it,” Tony looks at him, but his eyes are unfocused. Peter can feel hands on his shoulders and hot tears streak down his cheeks.

“I’m sorry,” his voice breaks and the older man’s head rolls away from him, “Tony,” his sob breaks off his words, and suddenly he falls apart.

His chest feels like it’s being ripped apart, worse than dying had been because then he didn’t have to feel. This time the feeling doesn’t go away, someone holds him as he sobs brokenly. He wants to scream but the sound won’t come out. His mouth just opens and closes soundlessly as he chokes around his tears.

Tony had done all of this to get them back, done all of this to protect them, to protect him. Why did the people who wanted to protect Peter Parker always end up dead?

There’s a commotion, but Peter barely hears it, too wrapped up in his own grief, dragging air into his burning lungs. How had the world not stopped? People are shouting. Peter wants them to shut up, to grieve, for some bullshit respectful silence.

There are hands shaking his shoulders, but he doesn’t look up. Someone is saying something in his ear, but he can’t hear them over the pounding of his heart, the rush of blood in his head. They say Tony’s name, something about Thor, someone is shouting for medics. He can’t understand them, can’t piece it together.

He shuts his eyes and lets himself drift away.

-x-

The compound was beyond salvageable. It was wrecked to its foundations. But Mr Stark always had plan B’s, far more covert than places like the Avengers tower, known to no one except Pepper.

The compound in New Jersey is nowhere close to the size the one in New York had been. The rooms are small but comfortable enough. Peter thinks about the fact that somehow there had been enough rooms for everyone. Tony had had his disagreements with the others, but something about this place felt like a peace offering like Tony had always hoped that one day they would all be together again. Likely under different circumstances.

Everyone was grateful for it though, the thought of not all being under one roof was clearly hard for some. Peter had seen Steve pacing one night, restless and upset before Mr Bucky had found him, convinced him to get some rest. Being near helped, put them at ease.

Which was why Peter found himself inside the medical bay most nights.

Tony still hadn’t woken up. He was hooked up to at least twenty machines, all of which beeped, whirred and hummed softly. His chest rising and falling steadily the only movement in the sterile medical room. Pepper hadn’t protested when Peter joined her for her silent nightly vigil. Being near helped, even if they couldn’t.

Thor had somehow been able to get Tony’s heart beating again, and medics had frantically worked to stabilise his condition. Now they just had to wait, to let his body heal and frankly, no one knew how much damage the infinity stones had done. The skin grafts had helped the healing of his burns, enough that the heart rate monitor didn’t spike every time the sheets were changed anymore.

Peter doesn’t sleep, a few fitful hours here and there when his body finally gives out to exhaustion. Sleeping felt too close to dying for his liking.

Clint is looking for Aunt May. Plenty of people had fallen off the grid after the first snap, and May had been one of them. Two weeks of searching had mostly turned up dead ends and cold trails. Peter felt guilty for not being out there looking himself, but both Steve and Pepper had outright forbidden him from leaving the compound's grounds, and he wasn’t really feeling up to getting on Pepper’s bad side right now. She was holding things together, no matter how exhausted she might be.

So, Peter had taken to entertaining Morgan during the long hours of the day when Pepper told him to go and get some rest. Morgan had taken quite a liking to Drax and Mantis, Drax was surprisingly a gentle giant with her, he gave the best shoulder rides and made the tastiest ice cream sundaes. Mantis liked helping her with drawing and colouring, and Peter noticed how she would keep a hand on Morgan’s arm when she was around, dulling her worries and tiredness so she would have a fun time.

But Peter was Morgan’s favourite. Peter told the best fairy tales and played the best make-believe. They would build blanket-forts filled with soft pillows and her favourite toys and disappear for hours until Pepper found them softly giggling together. Peter found how to set up the streaming services and got hold of every Disney movie so they could watch them together with sweet popcorn even though Peter preferred salty.

He found a bike the perfect size for her and taught her to ride it. She was fearless and picked it up rapidly, even with Drax hovering nearby like a concerned uncle, and unlike Pepper who knew she had nothing to worry about with Peter nearby. Morgan loved whizzing around on two wheels and Peter could almost pretend like everything was okay.

-x-

_The light around him is flat and unyielding. Horizon to horizon there is nothing except the vast expanse of orange sky. The panic spreads through his chest. He can’t be back in this place._

_He starts running, willing for his legs to burn, for something to appear on the endless horizon. There’s nothing, nothing, nothing. He calls out for Aunt May, for Pepper, for Tony, even for Morgan. Someone must hear him, someone has to save him._

_But no one is coming, just the orange sky spreading on for eternity._

Peter wakes up. His cheeks are wet with tears. He brings his hands to his face to wipe them away, but they are shaking so badly he can barely press them against his eyes. He forces air in and out of his lungs shakily, reminds himself that he’s alive, that he can breathe.

“Petey?’ a small voice rings out in the dark. He spots her in the doorway, clutching the ears of her soft pink rabbit, her dark eyes watching him intensely. “You were having a bad dream,” she says matter a factly, she doesn’t look scared. Of course, Tony Stark’s daughter would be braver than most.

“Yeah,” Peter whispers back hoarsely, “but I’m okay now.” Morgan looks thoroughly unconvinced. “It was just a dream, dreams can’t hurt you even if they’re scary ones,” he’s not sure if he says it to reassure her, or to convince himself.

She nods slowly then shuffles closer to the edge of the bed.

“Daddy always gives me cuddles when I have bad dreams, can I give you cuddles?” Peter can’t ignore the ache in his chest when she says it. Being so thoroughly reminded that Tony had had a whole life in the five years they’d all been gone. Sung his daughter to sleep, read her bedtime stories, soothed her when she had nightmares. He has to blink rapidly to stop fresh tears from forming.

He lifts up the sheet and opens his arms in invitation, and Morgan scrambles onto the bed and tucks herself snugly under Peters' chin, cuddled up against his chest. They lie like that in the dark for a while, Peter gently rubbing her back whenever she fidgets.

“Why is daddy taking so long to wake up?” she asks quietly and it’s all Peter can do not to tense up and stop breathing. How can he possibly explain what’s happening to Tony when he barely knows himself?

“You know when you fell off your bike the other day?” he starts tentatively. She hums and nods against his chest. “And you got that graze on your knee?” He feels her arm wiggle down to rub her knee where the graze had been.

“It’s almost gone now,” she says, resettling in the spot under his chin. Peter swallows the lump in his throat.

“But you had it for a few days didn’t you, even though it was only a small one.” She nods again, “It’s like daddy has a really big graze so it’s taking a longer time for it to get better,” Peter hopes that it’s enough to make her understand, hopes more than anything that he isn’t lying to her.

They lay there in the dark for several long minutes, nothing but muffled voices trickling down the hallway to break the quiet.

“I miss him,” she whispers, and Peter can feel the damp patch forming on his shirt collar. He pulls her closer, planting a kiss on the top of her head.

“Me too, Morgan, me too.”

-x-

He’s eating toast in the kitchen, even though he doesn’t much feel like eating. Steve had practically carried him to the breakfast bar and Mr Bucky had shoved food and orange juice in front of him, and Peter wasn’t about to not do what Captain America told him to.

Carol had dropped in the day before with a trunk full of the broken spider legs from his suit, ‘in case he wanted to fix it’ and gave him a hug when she left. Peter hadn’t opened the trunk. He hadn’t really thought about being Spiderman anytime soon for that matter. They dumped it in the hangar with the rest of his suit, still covered in dirt and blood from three weeks ago.

It was too much too soon, and he had bolted, shut himself up in his room for long enough that Pepper noticed his absence that evening and by midday, Steve had all but broken down the door to his room, concern painfully apparent.

So he sat there ripping the crusts off his dry toast under Steve’s scrutinous gaze, taking the occasional sip of orange juice.

 _“Peter, Miss Potts has asked me to inform you that Tony is awake.”_ Friday’s voice rings out in the silence. The glass slips between his fingers and shatters on the floor. His gut twists as he jumps to his feet.

“Peter wait,” Steve tries to get a hand on his arm but Peter dodges around him and he’s sprinting across the compound, lungs burning, blood roaring in his ears. Tony’s awake.

He bursts through the doors to the ward and stumbles to a halt, chest heaving and stomach churning. Pepper raises her head but doesn’t look surprised to see him there, she smiles, the dark circles prominent under her eyes.

He looks past her and meets his eyes. The skin on the right side of his face still looks red and sore, his mouth twitches with a weak smile.

“Hey kid,” and tears well unbidden in Peters' eyes as he hugs as much of the man as he can without hurting him, and Tony’s uninjured arm rests on his back. “This is nice,” he mumbles quietly, and Peter buries his face against Tony’s neck, the faint scent of dirt and fire lingering under the medical antiseptic smell.

“I got you back,” Peter chokes out, holding back a sob as Tony rubs his back gently.

“You got me, kid, you got me.”

-x-

Earth is still adjusting, the loss and subsequent return of half the population were taking its toll on the economy and infrastructure and things like education were being suspended while the fallout was getting patched up.

They were still looking for Aunt May, online records had gone to shit after the snap, and the apartment in Queens had been empty for at least three years. It hurts his head to think about it too much, that it’s been almost two months and Clint and Sam still haven’t found her.

The Avengers were adjusting too. The compound was gradually emptying. The guardians had left two weeks prior, Quill desperate to get back on Gamora’s trail. Morgan had been sad to see Drax and Mantis leave, even when they promised to come and visit.

Carol dropped by around once a week, she was busy helping planets besides Earth rebuild after the snap. She disguised her visits as informational reports and Peter was only too happy to pretend that she wasn’t coming by to check in on him.

Even Steve and Mr Bucky had found a couple of apartments in downtown Brooklyn, one for them and one for Sam to live next door. Steve had been reluctant to think about moving on at first and not until Tony came limping into the kitchen and slapped down a stack of properties that were on the market, did he take that as his blessing to move on.

Everyone else had their own lives to go on and move back to, though Scott would drop by for hushed conversations with Tony. Dr Strange had given up coming by after one particularly loud and angry row with Tony almost a month ago.

Peter doesn’t fit into anywhere, and the compound is suddenly bigger, emptier and lonelier. Tony still sleeps for most hours of the day and Morgan spends more and more time sleeping in her parents’ room.

It’s one of those rare times that he and Tony are sat alone together when Tony rest a hand on Peter’s arm and looks at him knowingly, the same look that Carol gives him when she visits.

“What’s wrong Peter?” he asks him, softly with no pressure there for Peter to answer. He knows he means the nightmares, the lack of sleep, those things that should be fading away by now. The way he can’t stop the flinching at bright lights and unexpected loud noises and the time he curled up in the hallway and rocked back and forth with his hands pressed to his ears. He’s not sure he’s ready to tell Tony about the soul stone yet.

“Aunt May,” It’s not a lie, it’s just not the whole truth. Tony understands and squeezes his arm and Peter blinks back unwelcome tears.

-x-

The lake house is unexpectedly homely. Peter’s not sure what he expected if he’d thought that Tony and Pepper would have lived in the New York compound. But of course, that was no place for Morgan to grow up, that place too full of ghosts including his own. The rooms crowded with furniture, the lack of clean straight lines because, Peter realises, this is a home. Somewhere for family. Somewhere to grow old.

Tony is worn out from the journey, so Pepper shows him to his room and leaves him to settle in. Pepper had told him one night during their vigils that Tony hadn’t much liked having guests after the snap. Yet here in a house Tony built during those five years is an extra bedroom.

The walls are painted a dark red, with exposed wooden beams, a colour that Peter thinks Tony would never have chosen to decorate with. Peter thinks about his favourite colour being red. Tucked in one corner of the room are an old PlayStation 2 console and next to it a stack of old Lego games. He had always liked older consoles since they were all Aunt May could afford to get him, and Peter would save up his lunch money to scour second-hand games shops for cheap PS2 games. The closet should be empty but in it, there are three t-shirts, a hoodie and a pair of jeans and these days it feels like Peter has a permanent lump in his throat.

This was his room.

The room Tony had built for him, untouched and empty for five years like Tony had known that he would come back and need a place to stay. Only he couldn’t have known.

It feels like a memorial. It feels like a tomb.

Proof that Tony Stark hadn’t moved on.

Peter doesn’t know what to do with that guilt.

-x-

That’s the funny thing about time. Everyone experiences it differently. Sometimes five years feels like five years, sometimes it feels like thirty minutes, sometimes it feels like forever, wandering aimlessly in the same unchanging orange glow. Time moves differently when you don’t need to breathe, can’t feel, can’t hear.

So much time spent in nothing makes feeling everything overwhelming. Pretending to be fine can only last for so long.

Peter used to love thunderstorms.

The rain batters down on the roof like a drum, amplifying every sound, every rumble of thunder, every gust of the wind and it’s too much. He feels suffocated, trapped with the endless noise.

He clamps his hands over his ears and struggles to breathe, his body moving without thinking and maybe someone calls his name as he stumbles out of the door and out into the rain.

He’s soaked within seconds, the rain so heavy it feels like hail on his skin, and he can feel every last drop. It’s quieter somehow outside. There’s the damp smell of the earth and the fresh grass and shivering feels like living and everything makes him feel like screaming.

So he does, screams until his lungs burn, doubled over and screams until his throat is wrecked. Fear and guilt and loneliness pour out of him and he lets them go, lets the wind take them.

Someone pulls him into their arms as he sobs finally falls apart after keeping it together so long. Tony’s good arm pull him closer and Peter remembers the last time he felt this safe. Before Tony had died. Before he got to tell him.

“I’m sorry Dad,” and he can’t stop his chest from heaving as he lets himself cry, face pressed tightly against Tony’s neck.

“It’s okay kid, shh, it’s okay,” and Peter can feel that Tony is crying too, the crutch dropping away from his side as they hold each other up in the rain, both broken, both clinging onto what they lost.

“I love you kid,” the words are a whisper, choked up and they make Peter sob even harder.

“I love you too.”

-x-

Hours later when they’re warm and dry, and Peter is curled up under the covers in his room, clutching Tony’s good hand he tells him. Tells him about his eternity of wandering in the soul stone. About existing without a body, unable to feel or hear or smell. He tells him about almost losing his mind in there.

He tells him how sometimes he can feel every fibre in the texture of the carpet, how he can hear Morgan breathing from the next room over, how walking down long corridors that look the same make his mind slip.

He tells him how he can’t stand the silence, but also how he can’t stand the noise, when feeling, being, existing feels like too much. Slowly the crushing weight on his chest begins to lift, one that he didn’t even know was there. Tony doesn’t say anything, just squeezes his hand and waits for him to finish.

“Why didn’t to tell me sooner?” Peter can tell that he isn’t angry, more than anything he just sounds sad. It makes guilt swirl in his stomach.

“I wasn’t ready to talk about it yet,” he whispers, voice still hoarse from screaming “and you were still recovering and busy and I…” he bites his lips, “I didn’t want to make you worry.” Tony squeezes his hand even tighter.

“You know you can always come to me with anything kid,” He says softly, “I’m still here, and I’m right here for you,” Peter nods against Tony’s thigh, his eyes burn but there are no tears. “You’re my kid, and I couldn’t protect you then, let me protect you now.” Peter sobs dryly, shaking slightly, and Tony lets go of his hands to card through his hair instead. “You’ll always be a part of this family Peter.”

The mattress shifts and a small body cuddles up against his back.

“Love you, Petey,” Morgan mumbles against his shirt. He turns over and chuckles as her hair tickles his nose.

“Love you too, Morgan”

An hour later Pepper finds her husband and her daughter fast asleep on either side of Peter, who looks more peaceful than she’s ever seen him. She smiles warmly and switches the light off on her family, whole and alive.

-x-

After the snap, May had moved out of New York and gone to live in Nebraska with a boyfriend, Clint tells them. He’d finally tracked her down to a small rural town was practically off the grid. By now though school enrolments had come and gone and without the certainty, Pepper had enrolled him in his old high school which was due to start in a month and a half. Peter didn’t want to be a new kid in a new school again.

Tony Stark and May Parker spent several hours on the phone together much to Peter’s embarrassment. Much arguing later it was agreed that Peter would spend the remainder of the time before school back with his Aunt in Nebraska, but when school rolled around, he’d be living back with Tony, Pepper and Morgan.

Which was why his suitcase was packed ready to drive across the country to see his Aunt again. Tony had wanted to fly him out but Peter wasn’t sure he was ready to handle flying after their disastrous last trip out of the atmosphere, a conversation which had left them both feeling rather meek.

It's early, the sun barely starting to rise. Morgan was still asleep, Peter had said goodbye to her last night, and snuck in to give her a kiss on the cheek this morning.

Pepper hugs him tightly and kisses him on the cheek and tell him she has packed him food and drinks for the journey.

Tony was always stiff first thing in the morning but limps forward and drags Peter into a strong one-armed hug. Peter had told himself that he wouldn’t cry, but his eyes water all the same as he hugs him back. They stand there for a long time, it could have been several hours, but it's probably only a few minutes, time's funny like that.

“I’ll be right here when you get back, call if you need anything,” Peter can hear the tears in his voice, neither of them is ready to let go yet. Tony had held on for five whole years.

“I love you, Dad,”

“I love you too kid.”

**Author's Note:**

> Yeah, Endgame officially wrecked me.
> 
> This is the longest one shot I think I've ever written and its also my first dip into writing Irondad and Spiderson.
> 
> I'm still grieving, and I'm sorry if this is angsty or rushed, I couldn't focus on anything but this for the last two days.
> 
> I'm not sure if I would ever add anything to this verse, possibly, but I'm still so broken after Endgame and I normally hate fix-it fics but I'm just so attached to all these characters, it's hard to say goodbye to some of them.
> 
> I don't know if I would cope with a cameo in Far From Home, i think we can expect at least an audio one and Peter Parker grieving and moving on. Yeah I'm not ready for that.
> 
> Anyway my socials are @laneboyheathens on Tumblr, feel free to yell at me or request other Irondad stuff so I can pretend Endgame doesn't exist.
> 
> Thank you for reading, Kudos and Comments are always appreciated <3


End file.
